


Come and See

by tyrsdayschild



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Canon Typical Violence, Child Death, Gen, Hannibal Backstory, Time Travel, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-23
Updated: 2014-09-23
Packaged: 2018-02-18 13:11:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2349611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tyrsdayschild/pseuds/tyrsdayschild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five chances Will Graham gets to kill Hannibal Lecter before it all begins. Inspired by <a href="http://hannibalkink.dreamwidth.org/3819.html?thread=6688747#cmt6688747">this</a> kinkmeme prompt</p>
            </blockquote>





	Come and See

**5**

Hannibal strides up to the cheap motel Will Graham is staying in. Everyone has thoroughly warned him about Graham's stand-offishness and eccentricities, but he isn't worried. He prides himself on his ability to charm, enjoys a challenge now and again. And if Mr. Graham really is impossible to get along with, well. He doesn't seem the type people will miss for long.

The container of eggs and sausage is warm in his left hand. Hannibal smiles as he raps on Will Graham's door. His mother always said the best part of cooking was sharing what you made.

The door swings open. Will Graham is standing there, hair tangled, clothes unkempt. Hannibal's nose twitches. The man is rank- stinks of dogs and dirt, and something ineffible, some sense memory Hannibal has forgotten. It ought to be unpleasant, but- he takes another breath, deep through his nose. He can't quite put his finger on what it is about the man that makes him want to like him, but there is something, niggling in the back of his mind.

Will, for his part, is openly staring at Hannibal, eyes dragging up and down, tracing his body's perimeter without ever quite landing on his face. His mouth is half open, lip trembling with each breath. His facial expression inscrutable.

"Oh my god," Will Graham says, in a not quite toneless voice, laced with an unidentifiable emotion. "Doctor Lecter."

Hannibal gives him a quirk of a smile, hoping to disarm the man, not sure what to make of his stricken reaction.

"Mr. Graham," he says politely. "May I come in?"

"I'm sorry," Will says, "Just a moment." He shuts the door in Hannibal's face, leaving it open just a crack. Hannibal tamps down a rising spark of irritation at the rudeness, listening to Will rifle through his belongings, wondering what the man could be doing, hears a soft click, and then wood splinters into his face, a bullet tearing into his shoulder with a thunderclap. He drops the container of food, his hand instinctively coming up to clasp the wound. He turns, pressing himself to the wall beside the doorframe, adrenaline surging through his body.

The door swung open fully and Hannibal threw himself against it, battering Will Graham as he ducked through it. He used the momentum to launch himself at the other man, grappling for the gun. Another two bullets ripped through his body, one through his chest and lungs, the other through his gut, striking his spine. Involuntarily, he fell to his knees, hands still clutching Will Graham's. It is not the first time he has faced death, but it is the first time in a long time he has not seen it coming, has not been in control, that he did not know-

" _Why_ ," he coughs out, blood bubbling out of his lips. Will Graham raises his hands, pressing the muzzle of the gun to Hannibal's forehead. Hannibal realizes, his brain already beginning to fade around the edges, that he had spoken in Lithuanian. His hands are gripping Will's wrists. He tries to crush them, to pull them away, but his prodigious strength has drained from his body. Will's face is still inscrutible, and their eyes lock. Will's finger tightens around the trigger, and-

**4**

Hannibal runs through the woods, leaping easily over obsticles. His heart is pounding, his blood racing. The rude little pig is running ahead of him, stumbling and wheezing. The stench of sweat and fear is tangy in the air.

This is nothing like hunting Mischa's killers. Then, his veins had burned with fury. Now, his blood sang with excitement. He smirked, hiding behind a tree, as the man stopped his running, wheezing, looking around in the low light of dusk, thinking it had lost him. Quickly, he ducked out from behind the trees and rushed the man. He squealed hysterically as Hannibal tackled him to the ground, straddling his midsection, hands wrapping around his neck and _squeezing_. The man's face turned red as he gagged and gasped, tongue lolling grotesquely, hands pawing at Hannibal's arms as he kicked his legs impotently, accomplishing little more than rocking Hannibal against him.

He felt _alive_ \- alive as he hadn't since the final kill. How could he have ever thought he could live without this? The world was full of cannibals, eating him by inches, sucking the life out of him. He has to do this to survive. The strong eat the weak, after all- to not fight, to not kill, to not hunt- to let this weak, puny thing eat away at him with a thousand disrespects- it would be _unnatural_.

The man's eyes roll back, his hands go limp. Hannibal is still breathing hard, and he tightens his grip around the man's neck, bearing down until he can no longer feel a pulse against his hands, until he's certain he's dead. Finally, he relaxes his grip, hands shaking with adrenaline. The smell of the man overwhelms him- he can feel his lungs filling with the air he's squeezed from the man, imagine it fizzing into his blood. His hands run over the man's flesh- he's nothing but meat now. He remembers the dinner party he threw to celibrate the completion of his fellowship, the way it felt like an empty shell of a celebration, the invisible distance between himself and his guests. He imagines sharing this with them- sharing something real, substantial, of watching them partake and _knowing_. He reaches for the knife in his back pocket, weighing what he wants to make against what he can discretely carry with him.

A stick snaps behind him. He turns- a man, maybe ten years older than him, is walking towards him, body half turned, gun raised. His eyes are shining and his muscles are taut- he's ready for a fight. But he hasn't fired yet, Hannibal thinks, wondering how much the man saw.

"You have to help me," Hannibal says, and the man's breath is caught away, his gun wavering. "This man's hurt," he continues, gesturing to the corpse beneath him, slowly getting his feet beneath him. "Please, I'm a doctor- we have to act fast." The gun steadies. The man blinks deliberately. Hannibal lunges, his eyes on the barrel of the gun, and-

**3**

Hannibal lays Mischa's small body in the grave. Awkwardly, he arranges her on her side, the same way she slept. She's almost entirely bones now- he reaches up and pulls the parts that had come detached when he moved her off the side of the grave, and tries not to think too hard about what he's doing as he lays them about where they should go on her body. She does not look like she is at peace, he thinks, as he levers himself out of the grave. 

He feels disgusting, covered in dirt and sweat. The smell of decay clings to him like musk. This final indignity thrust upon Mischa rekindles old anger for the men who did this. Scent and memory is tied so closely together- for him even more than for most- and he knows that whenever he thinks of Mischa it's this rot he'll remember, not the sour-sweet baby smell she had when alive. He strips out of his filthy shirt, picking up the shovel. He looks down at Mischa.

He should say some words, he thinks. It would be appropriate to cry. His eyes remain dry. There's nothing to say. Hannibal has learned to act, but he won't act for Mischa. She deserves, his honesty, he thinks. She was the only person who really loved him unconditionally. She wouldn't have wanted him to wear a mask in front of her. Hannibal scoops up the first shovel full of dirt, and tips it onto her body. It's easier after that.

Halfway through filling the grave, he hears the tramp of bootsteps.

"Hey! You! What do you think you're doing!" a boorish voice hollers out. Hannibal turns, sees a Border Guard tramping through the underbrush towards him, past the ruins of the hunting lodge. He raises one hand, palm up, raising the other arm while still holding the shovel, in half-surrender.

"I'm just giving this little girl a proper burial," Hannibal says tiredly. "Do you want to see my papers?"

"How did you know there was a little girl here?" the Border Guard demands.

Hannibal stares at him. The man was utterly unsurprised. Hannibal studies his face, trying to see past the wrinkles and gained weight. He inhales deeply, smelling the man, his brain racing through memories, looking for a match.

"You haven't answered me!" the Border Guard says, stepping closer to Hannibal, menacing.

"You're Dortlich," Hannibal says, like it's a ward to keep away demons. It works. The Border Guard stops in his tracks, staring at Hannibal.

"How did you know-" he says, much less sure of himself, and Hannibal interrupts him.

"I paid attention when you spoke to each other. I made a vow I'd never forget who did it." He drops his hands, refixes his grip on the shovel. Dortlich's face has grown pale.

"That means," he stammers, "That you're... the boy..."

"Not anymore," Hannibal says, and swings the shovel before Dortlich can answer, the metal clanging satisfyingly against the side of the man's skull. His cap goes flying off as he crumples to the ground. He turns his face back up to Hannibal, snarling and swearing, and Hannibal swings the shovel again, and again. The skull cracks, and Dortlich goes limp on the ground. Hannibal kicks him with his boot, turning him. He pressed the tip of the shovel to Dortlich's throat, balanced his foot on top, and forced it down- one more hop with all his body weight, and the man was decapitated.

Breathing hard, Hannibal ran a hand through his hair, brushing it off his face. The atavistic fear he had felt when he saw Dortlich had given way to- he had had sex before, but this was- he felt ecstatic, he felt _righteous_ , he felt-

Another man came out of the underbrush, following the path of the Border Guard. He was not in uniform, wearing Western style clothes, a pistol clenched in his hands. His wild hair and rough stubble made him look like a mountain man, in Hannibal's eyes.

"Hannibal?" the man asked, staring at him. Hannibal dropped the shovel as the man raised the gun, raising his own hands non-threateningly.

"It's not what it looks like," he said. The man frowned, uncomprehendingly. Hannibal wondered he should repeat himself in Russian when the man spoke up.

"Who's in the grave?" he asked in slow, clear English. The accent was not like that taught in the Lycee- Hannibal wondered if the man was American, and if so what he was doing in the backwater of the USSR.

"My sister," Hannibal said, "Mischa." He risked lowering one hand to point at Dortlich. "That man," he said, "Killed and butchered her." He did not speak of his own shame.

"Jesus," the American blasphemed. He was staring at Hannibal, sizing him up. Hannibal was an adult, legally, emotionally, intellecutually- unfortunately, his body had yet to get the message. "What are you going to do to him?" the American asked.

"What he did to my sister," Hannibal said. His voice sounded flat to his own ears. Let this man hear his honesty, he thought. What point was there in lying? He was in the right.

"And who else?" the man asked. Hannibal stared at him, not understanding the question. "Who else are you going to kill?" A thrill ran through Hannibal, and he shivered involuntarily.

"Just the men responsible for my sister's murder," Hannibal said.

"No," the American said. "No, you're going to kill more." Hannibal felt anger boil up inside him- how dare this stranger judge him? As if Hannibal's every move wasn't carefully controlled. As if Hannibal was an _animal_. "I'm sorry," the man said, cocking the pistol, and Hannibal wondered if this was a fitting end- to die here with Mischa, to be together with her again.

No, he thought, turning, running for the woods. A gunshot echoed throughout the clearing, and Hannibal ran as fast as he could. No, he wanted to live, to survive- he wanted to fight, but was all to aware of his own weakness. If only there had been more time, more time to grow stronger- he was already stronger than all the other boys, in a few years he could've fought this man and killed him easily. Another shot rang out- the tree just in front of Hannibal exploded. He lifted his arm, shielding his face, slowing his steps, and-

**2**

The knife slices through the cheek muscles more easily than Hannibal expects. The butcher's body lies bleeding at his feet, bowels spilling out. He dropped the two cheeks beside him on the tree stump. Without the flesh, the head didn't even look human. It was almost like pulling apart a frog.

It was a shame Momund had been a racist, misogynistic fascist, Hannibal thinks. He would've like to learn how to butcher properly. It would've been fitting to be able to display him in his own case, let everyone see what the man was made of. He tosses the head away, watching it bounce. The blood is beginning to dry on his skin, leaving him itchy and tacky. He licks the blood off his hand. It tastes like blood always did- nothing special. He eyed the cheek muscle, and wondered what the best way to cook cheek was. Part of him hoped it would taste different- but if it tasted the same, then maybe it wouldn't be so bad. Maybe Hannibal would feel better if meat was just meat. And Momund deserved it, he reasons. The man was a human animal- no better than a pig.

Foreign swearing was suddenly spoken behind him, and Hannibal whirls, leaping off the stump. No one could know it was him who killed Momund- not yet-

Hannibal tries to stab the man, but heavy metal whips into the side of his face, cracking his cheek bone. Large hands pin him to the ground as they fell, the man easily getting a knee on top of Hannibal's chest, weight crushing his lungs. Momund, half drunk and handling a fish, had been easy to jump at the side of the pond. This man gave Hannibal no such advantage, and Hannibal curses bitterly.

"How," the man asks in English, and swallows, eyes flitting around, not quite looking at Hannibal, "How old are you?" Hannibal tries to remember the English they taught him in school.

"I have thirteen years," he says, as smoothly as he could. The man laughs bitterly.

"Did you ever have a chance?" the man asks.

"I don't understand," Hannibal says, struggling under the man, trying to slip free.

"Shh," he says, brushing a hand through Hannibal's hair, the imposition making his skin crawl. He presses the muzzle of the gun to Hannibal's head. "Close your eyes," he says softly.

"No," Hannibal says, jutting his jaw, staring at the man, willing him to meet his eyes. "If you kill me, you look at me." Briefly, the man met his eyes, and gave him a small smile. He nods, and-

**1**

Hanni stumbles into the woods. The soldiers had fled his house. He wraps his arms tight around himself, shivering. He's cold, and hungry, and he could still taste Mischa in his mouth, and his stomach roils. Don't throw up, he wills himself- Mischa was inside him.

A man walks into view in front of him, and Hannibal freezes in fear, staring at the gun in his hands.

"Hannibal?" the man asks.

"How do you know my name?" Hanni asks, voice stiff. The man tucks the gun into the waistband of his pants and slowly walks towards him, murmuring in a foreign language. He gets down on one knee, reaches out for him. Hannibal hesitates- he wants to pull away but-

Hanni stinks. He hadn't washed in months, and the soldiers who killed Mischa hadn't smelled any better. He stank of sweat, and piss, and blood, and this man- he was dirty, but he smelled like clean things. Like forest, and fur, and _Mischa_. Hanni lets himself be pulled into a hug, burying his nose into the exposed flesh of the man's neck, just above his collar. They're both dressed inappropriately for the weather, but he's so warm. It's almost like hugging his father again. The man wraps his arms around him tightly, pressing a kiss to the side of his head that gets lost somewhere in Hanni's hair. He pulls one hand away. Hanni clings a little tighter, shivers, and the man shushes him, murmuring in words Hanni can't understand. One hand rubs up and down his back in small, soothing circles- the other arm wraps around him in a slightly awkward angle. The man murmurs something, and holds him tighter to him- there was a click- Hanni presses his face into the man's neck, breathing deep and thinking of Mischa- and-

**Author's Note:**

> Title a reference to Revelation 6:7-8 (esp thinking of the Death followed him part), and a Belorussian film of the same name, who's climactic scene (a young soldier shooting pictures of Hitler at increasingly younger ages until he's unable to shoot a baby Hitler) the prompt made me think of. I have not read any of the novels, and so am intentionally playing it fast and loose with Hannibal's backstory. I'm also being vague with the dates, because his backstory is so reliant on WWII, but that doesn't make sense in the context of the Hannibal TV show. Hope you liked it!


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